7 Reasons to Geocache While You Travel

According to geocaching.com, geocaching is a real-world, outdoor treasure hunting game using GPS-enabled devices. Participants navigate to a specific set of GPS coordinates and then attempt to find the geocache (container) hidden at that location. All you need to start geocaching is either a GPS or your smart phone. You can register for free on geocaching.com, create a new account, and once you have your account setup, you can search for geocaches close to your home, or your travel location.

I would suggest you read the geocaching 101 document that explains all the rules and steps for finding geocaches. My husband and I have been geocaching since 2006 and adding some geocaching activities to our travel has greatly enhanced our wanderlust trips. Here are 7 reasons to geocache while you travel:

1 – You will discover some very unique locations often not included in the local travel guides. Geocaches are placed by local geocachers and they often want you to see unique and different locations in their city. We’ve seen some caches that are truly one-of-a-kind such as the geocache at Barney’s Toilet Seat Cover Museum in San Antonio Texas.

2 – You could learn about the history of a certain location. We found that Texas seemed to have so many great historic monuments, statues, and cemeteries, and local cachers often included loads of historical information on their cache page. At the cache location, there often is a plaque with additional information about the site, and why it is historically important.

3 – You could learn about local heroes, artists, and political leaders. In Austin Texas, there is a large statue of Stevie Ray Vaughan, the first public monument of a musician in Austin. It’s a virtual cache meaning there is not actual log book to sign.

4 – You could follow the geocaches in a city and see many of the best sights. Many cachers want you to visit the big sights of the city, or the most popular areas, or the most historic areas. You can select your favorite types of caches, and narrow the search to easier caches or more complex ones.

5 – You could attend geocaching events in your travel location and meet local geocachers. We often set up a geocaching event at ports of calls of our cruise ship. Locals (and at times, fellow travelers on our ship) meet up at a set time, and on occasions, we have received offers of geocaching tours.

6 – Some caches are part of a series bringing you to various alike locations. For example, in Dublin, I had to visit 10 different bars to find 10 different caches in a series about the historic bars. I didn’t know they had things in common and would have likely not taken the time to visit those bars if it hadn’t been for finding the caches.

7 – When I worked out of town for long periods of time, I typically geocached on my own, on Sundays where I randomly picked caches that were located in areas I had yet to explore. It also forced me to be active given my week was mostly spent working long hours. Having geocaching as a hobby gave me something fun and interesting to do.

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Consider adding geocaching to your travel experience. You may discover some very unique finds!

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apptraveler

Retired exec consultant who traveled for more than 4 decades, both corporate and leisure.
I appreciate my travel experience and want to share tips, photos and stories with readers! I live in Ottawa Canada and have traveled to 31 countries.

Hello and thanks for your comments. We enjoy this hobby a lot, and it certainly has provided us with an added fun element to our travels. Let me know when you find your first cache! I suspect you will be surprised as how many there are near your place.

I only recently heard of this concept and find it so interesting, but have never tried it myself! You bring up some really interesting points about how it can bring you to places you otherwise wouldn’t have experienced though so I think I will definitely register 🙂

Thanks Leanne for your comments – you may want to try finding caches around your location – – there are so many in the world – in fact, when we were in Australia, we found many during our various stops with the cruise ship. really worth looking into if you like that sort of hiking and as we say “hunting for tupperware” (we have to put those caches in something! 🙂

Wow, I have never even heard of geocaching! I love learning about these types of things that you can do all over the world! That’s awesome. I am going to have to give it a try here in Bali and see what I can find!!!

Justyn,
Thanks for your comments. I was really curious about the geocaches in Bali, given that in 2008, when I was in India, there was only one in my area, Bangalore – – but here is a picture of Bali and the dots are all caches you can find, Are there any close to you? Keep me posted!

Hi Suzannah, thanks for your comments. If you travel with young kids (5 and up) geocaching is a great thing to do with them – for one thing, they love the idea of treasure hunting, and they are small and can see things we don’t! let me know if you try it out. You can actually start at your own home!

Hi Amanda, thanks for your comments! Nice to virtually meet another cacher! My husband does it much more than I do, he’s about to find his 25,000 th find! isn’t that wild! I’m barely mid 2000 – it’s such a a great fun hobby!

Hi Jas, Thanks for your comments. It is a really fun thing to do and you should try it out near your home, to start. You might just be very amazed at how many are close to your location! Let me know when you find your first one!

Thanks Jordan for your comments. It’s a hobby that keeps growing in the number of cachers and number of caches! I always suggest to folks to look for caches in your hometown – unless you are in a rural area, you likely will find some just around the bend!

This sounds really fun! You have a good point that this would get people to visit parts of a city that they maybe wouldn’t otherwise. Is it a complete surprise when you find the location, or do you kind of know what you’re looking for ahead of time?

Hi Erin, thanks for the comments. When you select a geocache to find, from the list on geocaching.com, you will see the following information – name of cache, who owns it (this case, it’s one of mine in Spain, Aldy is my caching name), when it was hidden, the difficulty level (1-5 stars), Terrain level (1-5 stars), and on the right – size. This gives a bit of an idea of size, then at times, people put hints on the cache page (such as magnetic, or in a special container, or up high). A bit more clues from those attributes. As well, you can look at the pictures that people have added to their logs. You can often see the cache itself. Hope this helps a bit, check out the Geocaching 101 resource – it will give you lots of great information, and let me know when you find your first one! Good luck!

These are all really great reasons to take part in geocaching when travelling! Now that 1 European country’s sim card gives you access to data in another (without additional roaming fees), it will be a lot easier to do this in Europe!